THE POWER OF HER | De’Vonna Pittman Is Still Building. This Time, She Says, She Is Building Herself

MINNEAPOLIS, MN (September 28, 2026). Inside the newly opened Nature’s Syrup Beauty storefront in the Baker Center Skyway, glass shelves are organized with architectural precision. Amber bottles of hair oil and jars of plant-based body butter sit in crisp, uniform rows, reflecting the fluorescent lights as foot traffic passes through downtown Minneapolis.

De’Vonna Pittman stands near the register adjusting a display label. At 54, she has spent enough years building public institutions, civic initiatives, and commercial ventures that she had several options when answering the question.

She could have pointed to the physical space around her: the company’s first permanent retail location, which opened this summer after years of pop-ups, holiday markets, e-commerce, and expanding retail partnerships. She could have talked about the Minnesota Black Authors Expo, a literary platform she co-founded to connect Black writers directly with readers. She could have pointed to her 18 years in Hennepin County government, or the young women she employs and mentors.

Instead, when asked what she was building that nobody could see yet, Pittman answered without hesitation.

“Me,” she said. “I’m building me.”

She paused, letting the skyway traffic drift past, and then repeated herself.

“I’m building me.”

That realization came near the end of a long conversation for The Power of Her, but it provides the essential frame for everything preceding it. Pittman does not present herself as a finished monument to local success. Instead, she describes an intentional process: learning to trust her own voice after years of holding it back, checking whether her daily actions align with her core values, protecting her time without abandoning her community, and building internal business systems capable of supporting the polished brand customers see from the aisle.

“I have quieted my voice for so long,” Pittman said.

Nearly two decades in public service taught her administrative mechanics, but those years also taught her how easy it was to stay quiet simply to survive the bureaucracy.

“At 54 years old, being a CEO, I am definitely learning to walk in my power,” Pittman said.

For Pittman, that power requires rigorous self-examination. She searched for the exact word during the interview before landing on it: congruent. She wants a life where belief, conduct, commerce, and personal values line up.

A Standard That Follows Her Into Business

Pittman speaks about standards with the intensity of someone who evaluates her own progress every day. She acknowledges that perfection is impossible, but insists that maintaining high standards is non-negotiable.

“Here’s another day for you to get it right,” she tells herself each morning.

That same philosophy follows her into product formulation and inventory planning. Formulation might seem separate from personal ethics, but Pittman treats them as connected. When customers question an ingredient, she looks into it. If a component can be replaced with an alternative that better reflects the company’s values without compromising safety or quality, she investigates the change.

She also understands commercial reality. A beauty brand cannot satisfy every customer preference at once; products need stable shelf lives and functional preservatives.

“You’re not gonna make everybody happy,” Pittman noted. Her responsibility, as she defines it, is not avoiding criticism, but making sure every formulation choice is backed by research and clear reasons.

That standard carries higher stakes now that Nature’s Syrup has anchored itself in downtown Minneapolis, a retail environment navigating its own post-2020 economic changes. Customers who once bought hair butter from a folding table at a winter pop-up now walk into a permanent store.

“We’re so happy you have your own store now,” customers tell her. The location represents more than retail expansion. It marks a shift from bringing products out to the community to having the community seek her out.

What Government Taught Her About Community

Before becoming a full-time entrepreneur, Pittman spent 18 years in public administration with Hennepin County. Her work included projects with the Minnesota Ballpark Authority during the planning and construction of Target Field. In 2020, she entered electoral politics directly, running for the Hennepin County Board of Commissioners in District 1.

Those roles offered different views of civic authority: as a staff member inside county government, as a candidate on the ballot, as an independent business owner, and as an organizer in the neighborhood.

When asked where lasting systemic change starts, Pittman did not hesitate.

“It happens in community,” she said. “The people have to lead it.”

Her time during the Target Field development reinforced the idea that listening must drive outcomes.

“We can’t just pretend that we hear what the community is saying,” Pittman said. “We actually have to listen to what the community is saying. Community is not your nightmare unless you make them your nightmare.”

She applies that same principle to commercial growth. Nature’s Syrup relied on word-of-mouth support long before it secured retail space. The storefront is a result of that community, not the start of it.

Making Room for Black Writers

Pittman’s focus on building platforms extends to Minnesota's literary scene. Years before opening her downtown store, she co-founded the Minnesota Black Authors Expo to address visibility gaps in publishing.

Her interest in narrative ownership was clear during a recent visit to the inaugural Midwest Black Book Fair in Minneapolis. Though her schedule allowed only a brief 25-minute visit, she made a point to attend.

“I wanted to feel the energy,” she said. “I wanted to lay eyes on the authors.”

Where others might see a competing event in a market where she had already established a literary platform, Pittman saw expansion. After learning about the new fair, she connected with leadership at the Minnesota Black Authors Expo to express support.

“It was another opportunity and space that can further our vision,” Pittman said. “It doesn’t belong to us. It belongs to the authors.”

Her approach rejects gatekeeping. The goal is not to own the ecosystem, but to build enough platforms that writers never depend on a single institution to be heard.

Writing as Internal Refuge

While her public profile centers on business and community organizing, Pittman maintains an active personal life as a writer.

“I love writing,” she said. “I never stop. I’m always moving.”

Accepting herself as someone with multiple creative callings took time. Writing gives those different interests a place to meet.

“Writing is therapeutic for me,” Pittman said.

Her work includes a memoir, poetry, The Beauty Burn Playbook, and a self-published romance novel. The novel gave her space to explore themes often missing in mainstream depictions of Black women, including emotional vulnerability, romance, freedom, and personal relationships. Her poetry, by contrast, grew out of grief and processing hard times.

While executive responsibilities have slowed her creative output, writing remains distinct from her public roles. Leadership requires outward communication and quick decisions; writing requires turning inward.

“Some people call a therapist,” Pittman said with a laugh. “My therapist has often been a piece of paper.”

Political Defeat and Economic Agency

Pittman’s view of economic empowerment shifted as she transitioned into full-time entrepreneurship. She views employment as more than income; she sees its direct effect on physical and mental well-being. Traditional workplaces, she argues, often subject Black workers to persistent messages about their limits.

Her 2020 campaign for Hennepin County Commissioner proved to be a turning point. Official Minnesota Secretary of State election results show Pittman received 35,951 votes in the District 1 general election, coming up short against Jeff Lunde’s 37,241 votes.

Despite the loss, the campaign changed how she sees herself.

“The act of deciding that you’re going to run for office is so empowering,” Pittman said. “You become a different person after the election. I became such a boss chick after my election. I already was, but didn’t know it.”

Stepping into the campaign altered her view of what was possible. If she could ask tens of thousands of voters to trust her with public policy, she could trust herself to leave institutional employment and build her own company.

She left county government to run Nature’s Syrup full-time. She does not romanticize the move. Running a business means carrying direct responsibility for payroll, making sure employees can pay rent and feed their families. Nature’s Syrup has never missed payroll, a record Pittman speaks of with pride despite the quiet stress of tight cash-flow cycles.

Business as a Training Ground

Nature’s Syrup Beauty functions as an incubator for young women, including high school and college students.

“Every dollar that we can pour into the families of young Black women, it’s an honor,” Pittman said. “We are a mentorship program.”

Recalling her own early career missteps and sudden terminations, Pittman approaches management with patience. She distinguishes between an employee who lacks capacity and one who simply needs clear instruction.

“I’m not willing to quit on them,” she said.

When Inequity Feels Like Invisibility

Pittman’s view of structural equity comes from personal experience. She recalls a typical afternoon at a local farmers market, standing in line near a menu board. Another customer pushed past her to read the options, stepped directly on Pittman’s foot without acknowledging her, ordered food, and walked away.

Pittman was angry, but the physical discomfort mattered less than the psychological impact: the feeling of being completely unseen.

Instead of staying silent, Pittman walked up to the woman. She explained that the customer had stepped on her and moved through her space as if she were not standing there.

“We spend our whole lives being made to feel invisible,” Pittman recalled telling her. “I am a human being.”

She introduced herself, mentioned her company, and noted that she worked regularly at the market. The woman apologized. Pittman made a point to clarify that she did not think the act was intentional, which was the main point.

Inequity, Pittman argues, does not always look like open hostility. Often, it looks like simple oversight: who gets noticed, who gets promoted, who receives grace when they make a mistake, and who remains invisible. She points to her years in county government, where she watched peers advance while she was repeatedly told to earn more credentials. She earned the degrees, but found that institutional recognition did not follow.

“We have to make them see us,” Pittman said.

Collaboration over Competition

Pittman is known in Twin Cities business circles for making introductions, sharing media contacts, and encouraging other founders. Her approach to potential market competitors runs counter to traditional retail habits.

She points to her friendship with a fellow entrepreneur whose product line directly overlaps with Nature’s Syrup in body and hair care. Rather than keeping her distance, Pittman reached out to welcome her.

“There’s no other brand like Nature’s Syrup, and there’s no other brand owner like De’Vonna Pittman,” she said. “You are your only competition. Collaboration over competition.”

She studies national brands, analyzes retail models, and learns from executives operating at scale. But she refuses to treat every founder as an adversary fighting for the same shelf space.

Protecting the Boundary

As Nature’s Syrup grows, Pittman has had to face a challenge common among prominent community leaders: managing limited time.

“You have to protect your time,” she acknowledged.

Her responsibilities now span investors, inventory logistics, staff management, regional expansion, family, and mentorship requests. The open access that defined her early years as a founder has given way to necessary operational boundaries.

She knows that setting limits can be misread as pulling away. Managing that transition, staying generous while ending unlimited availability, remains an active part of her growth.

When she needs support herself, Pittman turns to a circle of trusted women executives and entrepreneurs, some managing multi-million-dollar portfolios.

“They believe in me, and I believe in them,” Pittman said. For a leader who spends much of her life holding doors open for others, that reciprocal support provides necessary balance.

Building the Unseen Architecture

Inside the Baker Center store, customers see the finished side of the business: custom packaging, curated displays, and formulated products.

Pittman is quick to demystify that surface image.

“When you pull the cover off these businesses, mine included, things are a hot mess,” she said with a laugh.

Behind the retail display lies the less visible work of long-term business survival: standard operating procedures, tax planning, inventory control, fulfillment systems, and administrative processes. For Pittman, the current phase of Nature’s Syrup centers on making sure the internal operations match the public brand.

That structural work will not produce ribbon-cutting photos or social media milestones, but it determines whether the business can sustain its growth.

"I'm Building Me"

At 54, after 18 years in public administration, a high-profile county election, co-founding a literary movement, publishing books, and expanding a beauty brand into downtown Minneapolis real estate, De’Vonna Pittman remains committed to her most critical project.

The store in the skyway is visible. The products are tangible. The corporate filings are public record.

Her internal work has no storefront. It consists of unlearning silence, setting up operational systems, enforcing healthy boundaries, mentoring without enabling, and aligning her daily choices with her personal ethics.

As the interview came to a close, Pittman returned to the tradition of The Power of Her by naming other Black women leaders in Minnesota whose work deserves coverage. She offered contact information for fellow entrepreneurs and community organizers, opening doors for the next story before turning back to her store.

The storefront matters. The brand matters. The civic history matters. But De’Vonna Pittman is proving that public achievement and internal growth are not separate goals; they depend on each other.

After years of building platforms for the public to see, Pittman is giving that same discipline to what lies underneath.

“Me,” she said again, looking back toward her display shelves. “I’m building me.”

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